This was originally posted on the Big Soccer forums in December 2009.  I really enjoyed writing it, and it was well received.  I thought I would throw it out to the wider audience at some point and was a little surprised to see it posted this morning, I had scheduled it … and forgotten about it.

I met almost the entire Arsenal squad in 1989. I had to go to pick up a season ticket but as a Junior Gunner approaching the age where my eligibility for ￡1.50 tickets was in question I had to take my birth certificate to the stadium box office to prove I was young enough. It was the middle of the summer holidays, and the middle of the day when I arrived and I had to ring the door bell to the main business entrance to get somebodies attention. I was told to wait that somebody would be out in a few minutes and while I did Lee Dixon and Michael Thomas walked up the stairs and stood around with me.

They awkwardly said hi, I stammered something back. They asked why I was there, I told them. They told me they were meeting and that the others would be by shortly. Tony Adams, John Lukic, Nigel Winterburn, David Rocastle turned up a few minutes later, a couple more and the entire squad was there. It was the stuff of dreams, I was introduced to players by other players and when we were eventually all let in I picked up my ticket and said goodbye to a bunch of guys that felt like friends. I was of course one face in thousands but from my birth right at the front of the North Bank I’d occasionally catch the eye of one of those lads and for a few weeks afterwards I’d get a nod, a simple little acknowledgment.

A year later, a new Swedish superstar was born in North London as Anders Limpar signed and became an instant hit. One day after a game I had loitered around for long enough that the streets were largely clear of fans. I made my way down into the Underground, jumped on a Piccadilly Line train that would take me into Central London the first leg of a three train, and one bus journey home. Sitting directly opposite me on the train was Limpar, looking sheepishly at me in my colors and probably wondering if I would embarrass him or leave him alone. “You did good Anders” I said quietly, and he smiled and said “thank you”. Somebody else asked why he was taking the train and he shrugged and told us he didn’t have a drivers license yet and that he was still living in a hotel. He was a humble, friendly guy that was pleased to be playing for Arsenal but was surprised by how expensive everything was.

I was slap bang in the middle of my teenage years and I’d met my heroes and started traveling to see them. Stamford Bridge, Loftus Road, Upton Park (although this was a mile from home), Plough Lane, Old Trafford, Anfield, Goodison Park, Maine Road, Elland Road, Hillsborough, Roker Park, Ayresome Park – many of which are names you will no longer hear as many no longer exist but I went, and visited stadiums, and watched my Gunners win lose or draw. The Hillsborough tragedy changed things, changed the game as I liked, and got rid of the terraces, as England converted its stadia to all seater venues. I stood on the North Bank from the first game I went to at Highbury. When 54,000+ people were crammed into the old stadium for big games (Cup ties against United or the North London Derby) it was special, holy, just a sacred place in my world. I also remember sadly looking over my shoulder on it the last time I ever stood at the end before it was leveled to make way for a new state of the art, two tier all seated stand known as the North Bank stand. I only ever sat in it once.

This was the beginning of the end of my golden era. I’d failed as a footballer but never lost my love watching it but as the Premier League came into force and Arsenal grew from successful, to a new status as one of the elite (the big four really is new…..) I found myself increasingly marginalized and in the new world where working class joe on the terraces was replaced with young, upwardly mobile professionals. People who I had known for years disappeared, and the game that I could so easily afford as a child started to get out of my reach as a working adult.

There is little chance that the things I experienced will ever been known by any kid in England anywhere ever again. I miss the smells of cigarettes and beer at Highbury, that and meat pies. I miss Arsenal shirts with numbers on the back and without names. 1 to 11, 13 and 14 for the subs. I missed feeling like the players were just regular guys that could do amazing things. I don’t think Cesc Fabregas would go home on the train or that the guys would be caught dead waiting outside any building for a meeting by fans – god forbid talk to them. As I morphed into an adult these childish privileges succumbed to the trappings of the Premier League where my team made up of home grown talent and one Swede became French, then European. I stopped recognizing the names and faces and two years after the Premier League was formed I went to my last game at Highbury.

Dennis Bergkamp scored his first two goals for Arsenal that day. I decided I could never sit in the new North Bank and I left without ever returning.

A new era was born.

Arsene Wenger arrived and the rest as they say is history.

I don’t miss Arsenal games on TV but for all the success of both the Gunners and the Premier League I still regard the 1985-1995 era as the pinnacle of my life as an Arsenal fan. I didn’t miss a game at home or on the road between 1990 and 1993. I only went to home games in 1994. 1995 I went to one.

The point of this mini personal history is actually MLS. Where I got to meet Hristo Stoichkov on the field at Soldier Field when I lived in Chicago. It was in Chicago at an MLS game where I made my way onto the back page of the Trib with Fire player Josh Wolff scoring the winner against the Wizards hurdling the advertising hoardings. It was here that I was able to purchase season tickets, and here that I feel like people are listening within the organizations. Its here that I could conceivably meet players, and here that I find myself hoping for success and trophies. MLS has given me the game back in many ways.

If MLS is to be as big as everybody hopes it can be, there may well come a time when ‘your team’ doesn’t feel like yours anymore, and people like Rob Heinemann might not bother telling anything to fans, and folk like Sam Pierron will cease to be necessary because the TV deals mean more than the fans do. Maybe as old folk you’ll talk about the good old days, when the Kansas City team were called the Wizards and played in a crappy baseball stadium in the middle of nowhere with fondness.  You will maybe talk about how you used to bring your friends to games for free using unused tickets for prior games. Oh and that time that Kevin Hartman came to the bar after the game to watch the World Cup Qualifier and even bought drinks …..

As MLS, and especially Wizards fans – there is much to be thankful for.